Happy Thanksgiving!

Wishing the best and most plentiful thanksgiving to all of you as you gather with family and friends! 

Had A Great Class Today!

I took another canvas class today, and loved it!  I really enjoy working in the canvas medium along with all the dimensionals.  When I signed up for this class about two months ago, I didn't even know what the project was, it just sounded interesting.  I had done a class with this teacher before, the Paris book, and loved it, so I figured I would love whatever I was doing today-I wasn't disappointed.  Here are the pictures both front and back. 

 

I also have been busy working like crazy to get the house ready for holiday decorating.  Over the last week, I have completely taken everything out of the dinning room, shampoo'd the carpet, put everything back including cleaning all the glassware in the hutch, taking down the curtains and the sheers, washing and rehanging.  I started off Friday morning getting the lawn mowed and the leaves cleaned up before the storm hit on Friday afternoon.  Yesterday and today, I gutted the living room, and am waiting for the sheers and curtains to dry to I can rehang them.  The christmas tee is up and lit, but won't be decorated until Thanksgiving evening.  I also baked a couple of kinds of cookies yesterday, oatmeal chock chip raisin, and fluffernutter.  I also made a couple of loaves of banana bread, a sweet potato pie, a tamale casserole, and some burritos.  I really did enjoy cooking and cleaning this weekend because the weather outside was cold, windy and rainy.  Here is the simple recipe for fluffer nutters  that I got from here.  This is one of the easiest cookies I have ever done.

Fluffernutters
1 cup creamy peanut butter (I did use chunky, I like the peanuts in it)
1 cup marshmallow creme
1 egg

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.  In a large bowl mix the peanut butter and egg until well combined with a spoon.  Slowly stir in the marshmallow cream until just combined.  You want to see the marshmallow cream not fully incorporated, almost like swirled through.  With a small-medium cookie scoop, scoop dough onto a parchment or silpat lined baking sheet. (I used my professional baking cookie sheets sprayed with Pam and had no problem) Bake for 12-15 minutes or until baked through.  Let cool for 5 minutes on cookie sheet before transferring to a cooling rack.  ( I also didn't bother to let them cool on the cookie sheet-I transferred them from the cookie sheet directly to the marble slab and let them cool),

This week, I will have to start my sewing if I plan on getting done before Christmas!  Not too much to do and once I get started it won't take long, but I need to look at my calendar and pencil in one full day to sew! 

Until next time-

Finished Another Chunky Art Piece

I finished my second chunky swap atc piece and sent it off in the mail!  I enjoy making these and they would be great for all kinds of thank you gifts and just something to make the recipient smile! 

 Here are the four side of the wine chunky atc that I finished. 

Not much else is happening in the art world for me.  I need to finish about four additional projects this week to stay on track for Christmas.  I am also planning on attending the Harvest Festival this weekend.  I am looking forward to seeing over 24,000 handcrafts this weekend! 
 Until next time-

November Dress Finished-One More to Go!!!!

I finished my November dress this evening and wanted to get it posted before the middle of the month!  My inspiration for this dress was drawn from the fabulous colors of fall, the oranges and browns.  I also wanted to incorporte what I was thankful for in my life.  I designed each of the tags to hang off the ribbon around the waist and each one is something that I am thankful for.  Some things are serious and some things are things I just don't want to live without!  My thankful tags are: love, grandkids, employment, happiness, health, stability,spirituality, coffee, freedom and blue jeans!! A little rest and then I will be designing my December dress. 

Since I am planning on hosting the Dress Up 2011 next year in one of the Yahoo groups I participate in,  I hope all of you will watch this blog for the particulars and I invite you to participate!!!  This year of "girly" art has been so much fun and the short bursts of creativity have gone a long way for me on the days that I wasn't really up to a big, creative project. 

I also wanted to post a picture of my cabinet that I store my dresses in.  It is an old picture and I hope to finish the cabinet and update the photo.  I found this doll trunk at a thrift store for about $3.00 I think, and I decided the best way to show off the dressed would be in simple black and white.  I then found a photo of the Eiffel Tower and mod podged it into the trunk.  I still need to do something with the outside and I'm not sure if I will use this trunk for the next year's dresses, in fact, I'm not sure they will fit! 

 Thanks for stopping by and checking out my newest dress!

Working on A Continuation of Dress Up.

I, like many others was sad to see the end comming to the Dress Up 2010 challenge that has been hosted by Margaret over at Alice and Camilla and wanted to keep going.  I was even planning on doing this as a personal ongoing art project.  When the moderator of one of my yahoo groups saw my dress on my blog, she commented to me that we should continue this as a group-I thought why not spread the fun for all and continue with the ongoing project.  Sooooo-I am in the process of designing a Dress Up 2011 button, and will post soon about the project, so those who want to play along starting in January in the next comming year are welcome to.   I am almost finished with my November dress and will be posting that soon!

I took a couple of real quick art mini classes over the weekend, a miniature charlotte shrine necklace and a vintage calendar-as soon as I take pictures, I will get them posted.  These projects only took about 45 minutes for the entire class, and I am already working on a different idea for the vintage calendar for my guy for Christmas, again I will post the picture when I get it done. 

Lots to do in the next couple of weeks,  I am putting together a dress up box for each of the twin granddaughters for Christmas.  I will look for a couple of trunks that I can alter with their names and fill them up with all kinds of things.  I already found some great tutu's at Walmart for 75% off making them only $1.25 each, I am adding crowns, necklaces, bracelets, hats, purses and making each of them their own princess robes.  I made the superhero capes for the boys back in February for Valentine's day and they were such a hit, I thought I would adapt them to the girls.  I am trying to make this Christmas a little more homemade and not so much about money-not sure if i will succeed but I am going to give it a try...

Until next time-
Charlene

It's Fall! And I Felt Like Baking!

I really had high hopes over the weekend of baking some banana and zuccini breads-but that didn't happen!  Still, I wanted to make something and so pumpkin spice muffins to the rescue-and these are healthy too!

Pumpkin Spice Muffins (2 points on Weight Watchers)

1  18 oz spice cake mix (I also use a carrot cake mix)
1  15 oz can of pumpkin

Heat overn to 350 degrees

Mix ingredients together
Cook for 20-25 minutes
Makes 24 muffins-these are uber moist and will keep for days in a zip lock bag!

Nothing artsy to show today.  I spent the weekend, pulling out "stuff" in the computer/craft room and looking over things and putting away things that I am keeping.  Amazing, how much stuff one can accumulate in such a short period of time!  I will be back shortly with some finished projects for some upcoming swaps I am in.

Until next time-